Both aromatic and aliphatic sulfates and sulfonates are an important group of anionic surface-active agents used extensively in a number of industrial applications. These include operations in drilling for and recovery of crude oil; emulsifiers for pesticides used in crop protection; in shampoos and creams for personal care; laundry detergents; hard surface cleaners; emulsifiers for emulsion polymerization systems; lubricants; wetting agents; and dispersants in a variety of specialized industrial applications. Sulfates, being susceptible to breakdown in acidic environments, are limited to formulations used in weakly acidic or basic systems. Although sulfonates can be used under both acidic and basic conditions, they cannot be efficiently used in high electrolyte systems. In hard waters, for example, they tend to precipitate out as insoluble calcium and magnesium salts.
The present invention relates to the synthesis and properties of novel sulfonates that are not only electrolyte tolerant and thermally stable, and can be used in the applications mentioned above, but also have other interesting and commercially useful properties.